


If love is really good, you just want more, even if it throws you to the fire

by 1000lux



Series: Hexslinger Stories [1]
Category: The Hexslinger Series - Gemma Files
Genre: Happy Ending, Hexmas, Like a bowl of fire, M/M, Post-Canon, Rook comes back, builds on the bonus stories, in case the former tag was ambigeous, so sweet your teeth will rot off
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-05-14
Updated: 2018-05-14
Packaged: 2019-05-07 00:16:05
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,728
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14659200
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/1000lux/pseuds/1000lux
Summary: It is ten years after the end of the Lady Rainbow and the true beginning of Hexicas. Ten years after a hole in the ground had swallowed Rev Ash Rook in judgement he'd passed over himself. It's ten years, when the earth spits Asher Rook right back out. Well, his ghost at least.





	If love is really good, you just want more, even if it throws you to the fire

**Author's Note:**

> Disclaimer: I don't own rights to the books or it's characters.
> 
> So, after years I finally finished the Hexslinger Omnibus. And I just couldn't help myself and had to write. Because Chess and Rook are my OTP and I'm pissed, even though I guess the ending could have been worse. Also, some of the things in the epilogue I just couldn't ignore, so that's what I'm building this story on.
> 
> And even though I'm well aware that there's probably not really a fandom for this here, I'm going to post it anyway, just in case. ;)
> 
> EDIT: Removed some embarrassing logical mistakes. Mostly that a two year-old child probably wouldn't cry all night and would have already started saying it's first word.^^°

No control, no off switch in the way that you bringin' me down  
It's a turn on, get it away from me  
Know you mean wrong, keep away from me  
I just cry for no reason, I just pray for no reason  
I did it all 'cause it feel good

(Kendrick Lamar & SZA - All the stars)

***

So Chess is on his own again. Mid-thirty now and not as spry as he used to be. Mostly his greying hair if he's being honest. Thirty-five isn't that old even, same age Ed was when he met him. But truth be told, he never expected to get that old.

*

It is ten years after the end of the Lady Rainbow and the true beginning of Hexicas. Ten years after a hole in the ground had swallowed Rev Ash Rook in judgement he'd passed over himself. It's ten years, when the earth spits Asher Rook right back out. Well, his ghost at least.

*

Rook goes and finds Chess. Because he knows immediately where he is. Because he cannot but. Even though he doesn't know how he will be received, but knows very well that he has no right. No right to Chess (not for a long time now and who would have thought that day'd ever come?), no right to open up old wounds. Knows he well that he might find Chess with Ed Morrow or with someone entirely else. Replaced.

When Chess sees him, he shouts out such a blasphemous string of curses that it would have made the Ash of old tut reprovingly at his lover, the Ash Rook who's just returned from hell on the other hand, only feels a warm clutch of familiarity and fondness in his chest.   
Chess, already the moment the first piece of foul language passed his lips, started storming at Rook like a soldier into battle, face a fierce grimace. And even before he's reached him... Chess starts crying. Hick-upped sobs, that mangle whatever choice words Chess continues dishing out towards the no-longer man of God.

Ash holds up both hands, cause whether Chess plans to strangle or hug him, neither will work out well, given his predisposition. "Chess," he starts warningly. "I'm– You can't–"

"I can see you're a ghost, you idjit!" Chess growls snottily, stopping right in front of him, putting both hands through him in an ill-made, yet determined hug.

And yes, of course he does. Ash keeps forgetting how powerful his former lover is, when it was him who made him so in the first place. Probably because in the years (however many it might have been) in hell, he mostly liked to remember the Chess of old. Not because of how Chess had changed, but because of how he himself had changed. Liked to remember the simpler days. When they had been outlaws and Rook had been dishing out the word of God in an entirely unchristian fashion. When Chess had been at his side and in his bed nigh every hour of the day. And the mere thought of it ever ending would have been scoffed at by his red-headed fiend.

He's ripped out of his reverie by Chess' harsh but welcome voice.

"You better not be some fucking apparition, you son of a bitch!"

And Ash smiles, wide and happy. Thinks how curious it is that he's even capable of that any longer. And thinks, yeah, he deduced right, back then, at the beginning of his sentence. There is redemption and the pain does end. And even if he can't have Chess back, he's more content now than he ever thought he would be again.

How much time has passed, he doesn't know. Looking at Chess, he looks much the same. Obvious at first the streaks of grey, that still seem to fight a losing battle against the so much more powerful red of his hair. The beard is gone. That's a surprise. Makes him look younger than the grey of his hair could ever make him look old. The scar that Rook's been told about but only glimpsed a couple of times, is almost the tone of Chess' skin as it used to be, a lot more tan now (well, as tan as Chess can get before he burns up). There are a few lines on his face. But surprisingly they are in the corners of his eyes, not from frowning that's for sure. The earring that Chess used to wear, that was one of the last things Ash still heard before the rift closed forever (well not really forever for he's here after all, but who knows, for there sure was no hole in the ground when he got back), is expectedly gone, instead a scarred, empty earlobe. He's not as neatly dressed either. Clothes dusty and casually worn-down, color indistinguishable, except for the roses on the embroidered shirt he wears under his vest. And immediately Ash feels a surge of jealousy as he's hit by a wave of memory the garment gives off, a faint ownership someone else once had over Chess, however briefly.

"You gotta be kidding me, right?" Chess says, exasperated, with maybe a hint smugness. "You crawl out of hell and you think you actually get to be jealous about who I fuck?! When one thing's for sure, it's not gonna be you."

"Yes, that seems rather unlikely, given my predicament." Rook says, quickly overplaying his embarrassment.

"Oh, go bugger yourself, you fucking smartass!" Chess glowers at him.

Ash just smiles at him again, unable to contain himself. "I'm so happy to see you, Chess Pargeter. You have no idea."

*

Yancey of course, dead speaker she is, knows first. They're in the garden with Oona and suddenly–

"Oh shit!" Yancey exclaims. "Holy fucking– I cannot believe this!" At a look from Ed. "Rook is back."

And if he's being perfectly honest, Ed's been expecting that news for the past ten years.

*

"It's been ten years, if you was wondering." Chess tells him offhandedly, taking in his assessing and speculative looks.

"It felt longer." is what Rook replies.

"I guess it did." Chess shrugs. Does he still remember Ash falling into that hellmouth, like it just fucking happenend. But then again, a lot of stuff did happen. Lots of changes. Lots of people Chess got to know. He's fucking grown-up finally, if he was to put a word to it. Got things he's actually proud of (real proud this time, not like the number of kills he used to pride himself on, or his finesse at sucking cock– no wait, he's still proud of that). "Ed and Yancey got a kid now. She's eigth months now, the little one." he tells instead. "Named her after me and my momma, if you can believe it."

Rook quirks an eyebrow in polite interest, much more for the obvious affection for the small life that Chess is showing so unexpectedly. He never got to know Mrs. Kloves (or is it Morrow now?) or Ed Morrow well enough to care either way about their offspring, except maybe for the odd twinge of jealousy here and there, for both of them as it is. For, before them, he was certainly the only one holding a place in Chess' heart. But who is he to begrudge him that, when certainly the last thing he'd have wanted for Chess would have been to be all alone with all his anger and destructiveness? But, he's been proven fool once more, for Chess was neither alone nor destructive in his absence. And he has to wonder, if he's been the bad influence all along and not the other way around.

"For a guy with a purified soul or something, you sure have a whole lot of bullshit thoughts, you know?" Chess informs him.

*

Ash wonders about his welcome and when it will be outstayed. Wonders what part exactly he plans to play in Chess' life, other than the sheer primal need to see him that pulled him all the way here. He'd reckon a ghost lover is not much more use for Chess than a crazy god-priest lover. And then again, you are not Chess' lover, a snide voice that sounds like a mixture between his own, Ixchel's and Chess' tells him, are you? No, he's certainly not. And still he's here and not leaving either. Chess is sleeping in the single bed in the middle of the room they– he's taken in the small town they're staying at. Hair red on the more grey than white, washed-out sheets, even in the only moon-lit darkness. And Rook doesn't like that implication either, the moon the only one keeping them company here. But not the only one for sure, for Rook can still smell another man on those sheets, who's shared them only recently. And how's that, him still being able to smell? He won't complain though, for it also means he can still smell Chess, even if he can neither touch nor taste him. Well, he'll take three out of five gladly. That's more than he'd have hoped for. The question remains though... Ash is not going to leave on his own. While the attraction Chess feels for him might have waned with the loss of his magic, his own for Chess is still burning brightly. But if Chess was to send him away, which would be his right–

"If you even think about leaving," Chess has lifted his head from the pillows, glaring daggers at the Rev. "I swear to God, wherever you try to hide your sorry ass for whatever else punishment you reckon to take on behalf or your newest fancy idea– If I have to crack that rift in the ground open again and drag you out by your balls, you better believe I will."

And, oh, Rook does. And it warms his no longer physical heart and some other parts too.

*

Ash recalls once more his thoughts at the beginning of his time in hell, when he'd returned from being a god-priest to being a penitent sinner. Recalls thinking that if even Chess inevitably stopped thinking about him, no one would be left to remember him.

"What did you imagine, you dumb man?!" Chess tells him angrily. "How did yah reckon I'd ever stop thinking about you?"

"I guess I imagined you'd move on. I hoped you would, for your own sake."

"Don't make yourself holier than you are. Which we both know is not a goddamn bit. You're just as jealous a piece of shit as me, you only hide it better." Chess smiles widely, sharply. "So don't you go telling me you wanted me to go with someone else."

Ash nodds at that, openly admitting to the truth of it. "You are right, I didn't, I don't now. But I did not imagine either that I'd ever have the chance to see you again in this world, nor that you'd take me back."

"And I won't." Chess tells him haughtily. "I'd tell you to go and fuck yourself, but I guess you can't do even that any longer."

Chess on the other hand can. And does so, in Rook's full view. But if he thinks of this as punishment, he's very much in the wrong. The Rev is not going to correct him on it though.

*

Darlin'. 

The words on the tip of Ash's tongue all the time. But he doesn't dare to call him that any longer. That one term he'd always referred to Chess as, to the very last, even when times had turned and twisted everything they'd had until it was barely recognizable. The only word he's called him ever since he first started to. Because it was fitting. That's what Chess is to him. Something precious, coveted. 

Now, returned from the grave, he doesn't dare any longer. Refers to him as 'Chess', which he almost never did. First it was 'Private Pargeter', then it was darlin', and darlin' it stayed.

But he's illfooted around Chess now. Unsure about his place. And he should be, for he's neither here nor there. 

And it seems silly in retrospective, how he, almost until the very end, thought he could still fix it, that there still would be a way, because at the bottom line, he was just as caught and gone as Chess, could also never imagine a world in which they would ever be separated again.

*

"My love." Rook says and looks inherently sad.

"I don't want your fucking apologies!" Chess hisses. "They do shit for me."

"Maybe I'm comforting myself with it."

"Why did you leave?" Chess asks, and when Rook thought Chess had looked desolate when he first saw him again, in tears, he's proven better now.

"Because it was my punishment."

"Not mine?"

"Why would I punish you?" Rook asks truly disturbed.

"Don't know." Chess shrugs, face turning a bitter, inpenetrable mask. "But you sure did."

*

"What do you reckon I was doing with you gone? Fucking wait for you?!" Chess hadn't been waiting, no, that would have required active thought. The first few weeks he was barely able to do anything or aught. A dreadful panicking paralysis. Before Ash he hadn't thought he could love anyone that much. He'd thought he was fine on his own. But then again, after all he's never stopped loving Oona either and that had been by far the unhealthier relationship, lack of heart-out-cutting nonwithstanding. "I was fine without you. I moved on." He's almost willed to say 'maybe you should too'. But he doesn't, too afraid Rook could just dissolve into smoke and be gone for good this time. But the truth is, he did move on. He's made a life. And he feels almost bristling with irritation to make Ash see that.

"I know. You did well for yourself."

"No thanks to you."

"No," Rook agrees.

*

And it's the second month into their more or less companionable trudging through the desert, from one village to the next, that Chess decides he's pretended long enough what's been true the second Rook came barrelling back into his life with absolutely no regard for his peace of mind.

"Aw, fuck this." Chess says, surges forward and puts his lips where the lips of Rook would be, were he anymore than metaphysical matter. "Fuck you to hell, you bastard for jumping into that hole! Fuck you to goddamn hell for leaving me behind a second time! Would have forgiven you the first time, would have forgiven you the second time. And, so help me god or whatever else's out there, I'll forgive you this time too, and you know it, you big self-righteous bastard!"

Ash leans his head against/into Chess and in that moment they're almost melting into each other, it almost feels like he can touch. "I'm sorry, darlin'. You know I am." And just like Chess was in the wrong with his thought-out punishment, hell was too, if they genuinely thought letting Rook near Chess without being able to touch him was some sort of prolonged punishment. Because devil knows (or maybe didn't know), Ash will take what he can get, when it comes to Chess. And if it was after all God who's granted him this as a second chance, he can only thank him as the penitent sinner he is. And a sinner he'll always stay. "I love you." he tells the red-haired man in front of him.

*

Those who might have figured Chess Pargeter a rather shallow man, both should have known better and were proven better right now. For who would have expected Chess to faithfully stay with a man he can't fuck?

But news as it such happens, travels fast. And soon everyone who cares or doesn't care to know, knows that the Sheriff, emissinary and notorious bad boy of Hexicas, for a change, doesn't have a man in tow, but a ghost.

Things at the pub don't become any less awkward for it. One wouldn't guess it, but the years didn't dim down people's stupidity and there's still the odd bigot here or there, who decides that it's called for to give Chess his two-pence (because Chess' been known to play by the book for years now, so there's a fair chance he'll make it out alive). So when Chess sits down at the bar, with a ghost beside him, and none other than the infamous Asher Rook, there is bound to be a tad bit of chitter-chatter no doubt. It's not helped by the fact that while Chess drinks, the Rev stands beside him, hulking and silent, like a particular sober haunting. 

Since that's the case, though, the lines Chess is presented with by the townfolk, are more along the lines of, "Excuse me, Sheriff Pargeter, but is that a ghost?"

One would think people would have gotten used to ghosts, along with the hexes.

The thing is, despite Chess having lived far from celibate with the Rev gone (and why would he, honest to God, the gut-searing pain in his heart region non-withstanding), anyone who knows him even a bit would be able to clearly state one thing. Chess Pargeter with his ghost of a boyfriend or husband as Ixchel used to say (and was maybe closer to the truth than anybody else) seems more content than at anytime in the past ten years when he'd fucked his way through the hex or no hex population of the such inclined.

*

No one quite dares to ask however Rook got his body back and what exactly it's made off. For all they know Chess might have put the Rev's ghost in a corpse and put a glamour on it, or just have baked a new body out of clay, twigs and sheer determination. Fact is though, he is back in whatever questionable flesh and the two are going at it again as they used to. 

Songbird of course can tell, what exactly Chess did. She, after all, was the one who helped him do it. But she won't tell, because it amuses her to hear people guessing, when the actual truth is so much less frivolous than the public opinion.

*

They're all at the big fancy international meeting of the hex-integration society, that Yancey once saw in that vision years ago.

Turns out the man Yancey saw beside Chess that day, was all along none other than Ash Rook himself. And looking back, anyone would have to concede that that just makes sense.

Ed sure isn't surprised, given what he knew of both men. Still remembers Chess' inconsolable crying at the closed chasm that had just swallowed the man who might maybe not have been the one physically holding his heart these past months but nevertheless had been the firm owner of it all along. And sure enough Chess had looked like his newly reaquired heart had been ripped right out of his chest again, jumping after Rook into the abyss. 

And as it turns out the hunger that made out their relationship had nothing to do with hex or no hex and is still very much there, unbroken by betrayal, ressurrection and ten years separation.

And the Rev stands there impossing as ever besides Chess slighter form, despite merely being introduced as Chess' 'companion', and having no official function here. And nothing much has changed between them, despite Chess claiming the wisdom of his questionable age (and Ed tries not to feel insulted by that). But, oh, Ed thinks, Rook must be surprised enough by the changes he sees in Chess. That he probably would have never predicted. 

But when the two are together nothing has changed at all, Ed and Yancey having close enough privy to that, with Songbird having made sure they get adjoining rooms, either as a joke or unexpected thoughtfulness (which might be just as likely seeing as just like Chess she has changed too). Nevertheless the walls are thin. And Rook and Chess seem to be arguing as vigorously as they're fucking. Sometimes at the same time. Ed consoles himself only with the fact that the two are probably woken up as often by Oona-Cheshire-Yrsa's crying, as Ed and Yancey are by their varied shows of affection or other.

Ed never liked Ash Rook all that much. Chess had garnered his affection and loyalty pretty fast and entirely without effort, and it has not waned over time and distance. Rook could never claim any such thing. But exactly because of his affection for Chess Ed is glad to see the tall, sometimes self-rigtheous, sometimes self-condemning man who could never let go of Chess Pargeter anymore than Ed could, back among the living. Because while he would have wished someone nicer and better for Chess, they had all known there would be no one else. Charlie in all his efforts had shown that alright. And before he watches his friend work his way through half-loves for the rest of his life (or how many more lifes Chess Pargeter is going to have) he is glad to see that one and seemingly only possible love returned to him. No matter how destructive. And are they really so much worse than anybody else who loves? All good intentions that blow up in your face. Ed should know, having layed out a vegetable garden for Yancey, hoping for it to be a nice surprise, where he's now cultivating tomatoes and cucumbers, because she isn't that kind of woman.

"Well, I guess, I won't have to worry about you and Chess eloping one day, now, do I?" Yancey states drily, with a smirk, as they're once more woken by a bed continuously hitting against their adjoining wall. And it's not petty, when Yancey later that night steps as close to that wall as possible when Oona wakes up crying like she's on fire. It is petty though, when even later, in the early hours of the morning, she resolutely and more loud than knuckles on a door should be, knocks the two out of their sleep, until a sleep-addled, mumbling Chess finds his way to the door, looking like a bird made a nest in his hair, followed by the looming figure of the Rev who looks also uncharacteristically unkempt and blurry-eyed, wearing only a pair of pants, which is a look that makes him seem a lot more approachable. And if Chess thinks the fact that he's completely naked, will do anything to scare off Yancey and let him go back to sleep, he better think again. 

"Woman, do you know what time it is?" Chess asks, rubbing his eyes blearily, giving a scowl at Yancey and a affectionate wink, at the little babe in her arms.

Yancey simply holds out her daughter, a blanket and some toys and tells him that as her godfather it's his duty now to look after her, because she needs to get some sleep.

"You wanted a kid!" Chess exclaims with the exasperatedness of someone who sees his last few hours of sleep dwindling away. "You had to know there would be consequences!" Rook that asshole has meanwhile simply heaved himself back to bed, hitting it like a felled tree.

"A little puking, shitting and crying too much to handle for you, Cheshire?" Yancey asks, eyebrow raised.

Chess bares his teeth at her. "Sounds a lot like the place I grew up. And for the record, I brought that kid into this world." He takes Oona from her hands with a proprietary claim. "If you think there's anything you could still scare me with, you better think again. And, hey," He winks at her, sharkish smile. "I won't begrudge you a chance to get frisky with our Ed over there."

Yancey saves her exasperated claim that her and Ed won't be getting frisky again until Oona's old enough for school and they'd had many years of follow-up sleep, and instead puts a kiss to Oona's forehead, then to Chess' too, watching as his nose crinkles in distaste, even as his mouth pulls into a unwilling smile.

"I'd say goodnight." Yancey says in parting, devilish smile in place. "But for one thing, it's almost morning, and for another, you won't be sleeping any, and not for the reason you prefer either." And how'd it come to pass, that she'd be the one exchanging raunchy jokes with Chess, without even the proper pretense of embarrassment... Well, Ed, always says how the two of them are too much alike. And, well, she thinks he might be right too.

*

Chess trudges back to his lover, kicking him with one foot, as he sits down on the bed, cradling his goddaughter in one arm. Rook just sleeps on, unperturbed, or at least pretending. Hell must have really taught him a thing or too, for Chess has it on good confidence, that he's got a pretty good kick on himself.  
He looks at the little girl who wears both his and his mother's name (and god help the world if she turns out even half the feisty bitch he is or his mom was). "Now would be a good time to start screaming down a storm," he tells the little girl, holding her close to Ash's ear. Voice as soft and smile as fond as probably hardly anyone but the parents of said child have ever seen on him. The kid stays silent though and just smiles happily at her uncle (even if in name only, but hell he delivered that kid, wrist deep in her mama's– nevermind), gurgling a little but seemingly not intending to voice any kind of discomfort with her situation or the world in general. Beside him Rook snorts, confirming Chess' suspicion of him only pretending to sleep. "Ass." Chess kicks him again.

"Now, darlin'" Rook's deep rumble of a voice trails over the bed right into Chess heart and dick (and that's really no way to think with a kid in the room even Chess knows that much, even though he thinks both Yancey and Ed are lying if they claim they've been celibate the whole time, just because of Oona in the room, and given the girl's nearly a year now, he'd think Yancey would have somewhat recovered by now, it's not like she kicked Ed out after the birth with the shout of 'all men are pigs' or anything). "That's no way to be talking in front of a child, now is it?" He rolls over to the side and throws a fond and self-contented smile at Chess. Which he can, the big bastard, as seemingly nothing's stopping him from going back to sleep, after having fucked Chess through the mattress for most of the night. 

"Go fuck yourself sideways, Ash." Chess growls, half-heartedly, face in an impish smile. "I'll take pride and responsibility in making sure that girl turns out exactly as foul-mouthed as me. Make sure her first word will be something along the lines of sumbitch."

Rook chuckles and pulls Chess on his back, placing a kiss on his mouth, while the little lady rests comfortably on Chess' chest.

 

Next door there's incredulous silence that stretches on as the silence next door stretches on.

Ed and Yancey are lying in bed, not even attempting to sleep, listening sharply for the tell-tale wail from next door that doesn't come.

"You gotta be kidding me." Yancey finally exclaims.

"I told you," Ed shrugs helplessly. "He's better with her."

"That son of a bitch." Yancey growls. "We have to invite him more often. You know what, I'm too angry to sleep now. Let's do exactly as he recommended and let's get frisky." She glowers at him with determination.

And, yes, Ed will have to thank Chess in the morning.

*

Oona-Cheshire-Yrsa does say her first word only three months later.

As it turns out it is 'sumbitch' and she proudly says it to anyone she meets. People are surprisingly endeared by it.

*

At the same time hell opened to return Ash Rook to this world and continue a love story much more bloodthirsty and destructive than Romeo & Juliet had ever been, it also spat out English Oona, Sheriff Love and Kees Hosteen. Hank Fennig and Clo following a little behind, already arguing again. 

But somehow it took a lot longer for anyone to take notice of that.


End file.
